eBay knockoff GT35R testing.

[1fastlaser]

sounds like he eather fried some rings or some pistons... what injectors/timing/fp was the car on.

 

[rrussell]

Yes, they do. But I would recommend to buy or contact these people. They are authorized dealer.

Massachusetts
Team XXX Racing
Contact: Rob or Andrew

Framingham, Massachusetts 01701
United States
617-908-1584
Fax: 508-872-1730
Team XXX Racing - Home
[email protected]his e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

I'm looking at ordering one of these today. Are they a sponser on this site?

Is there any other manifolds that would be like this one?

 

[JusMX141]

At 8:35am on 9/4/08, the eBay GT35R was pronounced dead.

He called this morning while I was on my way to work- said he pulled the intake and there's TONS of play, and the compressor wheel is all jacked up from hitting the housing. The funny thing is the turbo still made 22psi while it was dying, and the car even trapped 105 on the last pull of the night despite pulling out slowly from the tree.

It lasted 400 miles.....barely enough time to get the car tuned properly. We installed it by the books- ran the oil feed to the head with an inline filter and a volume restrictor, and it STILL died. I'm rather disappointed- it really appeared to be quite a well-built piece. I'm going to pursue a warranty claim from the seller, although I'm probably just going to get a poke in the eye. If they don't want the turbo back or are unresponsive to my warranty claim, I'll rip the turbo apart and try to see what exactly what went wrong (DSM-onster will be proud).

I feel bad if anything I've said in this thread up to this point has convinced anyone this was a worthwhile turbo; it's not. Just like all of the other Chinese Wal-Mart knockoff junk turbos that are flooding eBay, there may be some good ones....but this one sure wasn't.

 

[98gst14b]

Lol, o well I had a similar incident but it was a ebay evo 3 16g..... lasted 300 miles.

 

[dsm-onster]

Make them better, if you can .

 

[prostreetdsmx1]

I knew it would just be a matter of time. I hate to say it but the sayings "if it looks to good to be true.." and "you get what you pay for" have always summed up the way it goes.

 

[JusMX141]

I figured the same, although I was willing to give it a shot since it was a new item and the turbo was ball-bearing; perhaps a way to step ahead of the weak journal-bearing turbos that the chinese are known for producing. I was wrong.

There may be some good ones in circulation; but for those who are getting reliable chinese turbos, I'm still going to assume this analogy: "If you buy a new box of condoms and 11 out of the 12 break, what does that say for the one that didn't break?"

 

[turbolarry]

This is why I love this site and the guys here who take chances. OK this one did not pan out, but if it had...?
jusmx141 thanks for your work.

 

[Ludachris]

Ahhh, my old friend Larry. Good to see you posting on the site.

I'd be very weary of an ebay knock off turbo myself. But I too, am glad to see others are still taking risks to help educate the community. Thanks for all the info on this guys.

 

[JusMX141]

Make them better, if you can .

I've done that with the eBay Evo III's....all you need is a true Garrett rebuild kit. The chinese made the shafts thicker on the 16G's once they started breaking, and the turbos now use Garrett-spec journal bearings and turbine seals mated to a Mitsubishi-spec thrust plate and compressor collar / seal.

If you get a new eBay Evo III and pull it down IMMEDIATELY to replace the journal bearings and turbine seal with Genuine Garrett parts, theoretically it should be just fine if everything is in balance. But at what cost? $250ish for the turbo, $75-$100 for the Genuine Garrett parts, possibly $40 to send the parts out to ensure they are in correct balance....you're now at $400. For that you might as well buy a MHI turbo from the get-go....you could just bolt it on without dicking around finding parts, porting wastegate holes, doing the labor, etc.

With the 35R, I saw an opportunity to get a ball-bearing turbo at 1/4th the price of a real Garrett. If it held up, that would've been an AMAZING deal, but it was a complete waste. The one I bought was actually one of the cheapest ball-bearing 35R knockoffs I've seen sell on there....some go as high as $550+. Think of the disappointment if we had spent that much just to have this thing puke it's guts at the 400 mile mark! It's a good thing his labor is free....the hassle of welding up an o2 housing, re-routing the intercooler piping, tracking down a manifold- if someone had paid a shop to do the work, you could be in REALLY deep with a junk turbo.

 

[rrussell]

Crap!!!! Thanks for the info.

 

[JusMX141]

There's a chance yours will be OK, Russell....but I wouldn't part with that Sleeper 16G too soon!

 

[rhamlinii]

I've done that with the eBay Evo III's....all you need is a true Garrett rebuild kit. The chinese made the shafts thicker on the 16G's once they started breaking, and the turbos now use Garrett-spec journal bearings and turbine seals mated to a Mitsubishi-spec thrust plate and compressor collar / seal.

If you get a new eBay Evo III and pull it down IMMEDIATELY to replace the journal bearings and turbine seal with Genuine Garrett parts, theoretically it should be just fine if everything is in balance. But at what cost? $250ish for the turbo, $75-$100 for the Genuine Garrett parts, possibly $40 to send the parts out to ensure they are in correct balance....you're now at $400. For that you might as well buy a MHI turbo from the get-go....you could just bolt it on without dicking around finding parts, porting wastegate holes, doing the labor, etc.

With the 35R, I saw an opportunity to get a ball-bearing turbo at 1/4th the price of a real Garrett. If it held up, that would've been an AMAZING deal, but it was a complete waste. The one I bought was actually one of the cheapest ball-bearing 35R knockoffs I've seen sell on there....some go as high as $550+. Think of the disappointment if we had spent that much just to have this thing puke it's guts at the 400 mile mark! It's a good thing his labor is free....the hassle of welding up an o2 housing, re-routing the intercooler piping, tracking down a manifold- if someone had paid a shop to do the work, you could be in REALLY deep with a junk turbo.

Just get a new center section from pte, garret, or bw. You'll still make out with the setup. 1000.00 for a t3/t4 kit, is a steal. It's not the end of the world, just make sure that kid's motor is still good.

 

[rrussell]

I noticed on mine it has a lot of side to side movement already.



I might just send this piece back.

 

[JusMX141]

I noticed that as well, Russell; but all ball-bearing turbos I've had in my hands prior to this one had the same movement so I wasn't concerned. It's common for ball-bearing turbos to have movement that would make a journal-bearing turbo seem worn out.

 

[rrussell]

I noticed that as well, Russell; but all ball-bearing turbos I've had in my hands prior to this one had the same movement so I wasn't concerned. It's common for ball-bearing turbos to have movement that would make a journal-bearing turbo seem worn out.

I think I will grab a cheap ss autocrome manifold and see which one breaks first.

Its one of those deals that curiosity got me and I wanted to see if it would work and how long it would last.

This is the one I got by the way.

eBay Motors: NEW GT35R Turbocharger Dual Ball Bearing Turbo DBB (item 350092578746 end time Aug-27-08 07:36:30 PDT)

 

[92awddsm]

I think I will grab a cheap ss autocrome manifold and see which one breaks first.

Its one of those deals that curiosity got me and I wanted to see if it would work and how long it would last.

This is the one I got by the way.

eBay Motors: NEW GT35R Turbocharger Dual Ball Bearing Turbo DBB (item 350092578746 end time Aug-27-08 07:36:30 PDT)

I honestly have an issue buying a turbo that has a tag labeled "turbocharger". I know its a turbocharger, you know its a turbocharger, but evidently, the chinese workers dont know what it is so they have to label it so it gets boxed correctly. Could you imagine ordering a china built turbo but getting a china built wg just because it was boxed wrong and nothing was tagged?

 

[JusMX141]

I think I will grab a cheap ss autocrome manifold and see which one breaks first.

Another buddy of mine tried the T3 SSAutochrome manifold with some larger T04E Garrett turbo he had; the two problems he ran into was the wastegate pipe was too long and had to be shortened, and the turbo flange wasn't at a good angle and made his turbo hit the water pipe on his 2G. He ended up making it work, but it took some time and creativity.

They must've designed that manifold on a car that had no power steering.....where the wastegate pipe locates the flange, you have about 2" before it hits the p/s pump.

Do whatever you can, but don't wrap alot up in this project as you've seen the outcome of mine! Once you get it installed, you become the proverbial leader of this thread!

 

[rrussell]

Another buddy of mine tried the T3 SSAutochrome manifold with some larger T04E Garrett turbo he had; the two problems he ran into was the wastegate pipe was too long and had to be shortened, and the turbo flange wasn't at a good angle and made his turbo hit the water pipe on his 2G. He ended up making it work, but it took some time and creativity.

They must've designed that manifold on a car that had no power steering.....where the wastegate pipe locates the flange, you have about 2" before it hits the p/s pump.

Do whatever you can, but don't wrap alot up in this project as you've seen the outcome of mine! Once you get it installed, you become the proverbial leader of this thread!

Thanks again for the heads up on the ss autochrome.

I think I will go with my original plan and get a ERL manifold. After the turbo dies I will get a real turbo

I will keep everyone informed on how it goes.

 

[JusMX141]

I think that's what we're going to end up doing with my buddy's car. He's already turned loose of his DSM-flanged manifold, so it's going to be all Garrett T3 from now on.

He said he's done for good with ball-bearing turbos because of the up front cost and replacement cost.....and they're rather delicate to boot. From here it's looking like a journal-bearing 60-1 with a 4-bolt turbine housing outlet will be the winner; that way it bolts exactly in place of the 35R.

 

[redtsi252]

Wow...Iam really dissapionted....Please tear it down and tell us what went wrong...For all we kno it could have some junk from the motor in it...Please tear it down and tell us why it Failed...

Thanx again on this thread and helping out the DSM community

 

[JusMX141]

Motor's strong....135-140 across the deck. There's an inline filter on the turbo, too; and it was as clean as the day it was installed.

The turbo simply took a sh!t, no doubt about it.

I'm in the process of communicating with the seller (who apparently has been viewing this thread as well....HI!

You must be logged in to view this image or video.

) and I'm not sure if there will be a warranty accepted or not. If the warranty isn't accepted, I'll be ripping it down for sure. The seller claims that "what he sees is that I took it apart when I got it and put it back together, then had a misfire due to too much boost on pump gas." He also made a remark about having a screen for an air filter, as if ANY of these things caused the turbo to fail. He's simply trying to opt out of honoring a warranty for his crappy turbo.

It HAD an air filter, which was removed and replaced with screen for the strip. This thing would've failed at 8psi the same as it did at 22. The car's wideband showed no leaner than 11.5:1 anywhere in the pass, so there was plenty of fuel. Even if it were to detonate, that generally harms the ENGINE wayyy before the TURBO, am I wrong?

Removing the housings isn't "taking the turbo apart", and the car got knock BECAUSE the turbo failed, numbnuts....end of story.

 

[dsm-onster]

What? there is no chance a turbocharger could fail from knock. Not that it WOULDN'T happen after the engine failed. But ZERO chance that it could cause it to fail. Unless the engine spewed guts into the oil. Let's think about that for a moment . If there's no guts in the oil, there's no correlation between the turbo failure and engine failure. . . Tell them to produce how knock has lead to turbo failure where there is no engine damage. The turbo doesn't care how the engine explodes the air and fuel it gets. What a loser to make such a claim. There's a stock awd dsm with a 14b upgrade for sale on ebay whose beaten a viper, too

 

[VETTE_50_TH]

Awesome thread jusmx141. Great information. I hope you get you warranty taken care of, its bullshit when sellers dont stand behind what they sold. I'm glad you took the risk when you had the chance and let a LOT of people know how those chinese turbos really are.

James

 

[JusMX141]

Thanks for all the encouragement, it was well worth it in the end.

I honestly didn't expect it to fail so soon. I was expecting to see it die around the 3000-5000 mile mark, when my buddy really cranked up the boost....but MHI 20G's can make 22psi for tens of thousands of miles, so I really felt this turbo had alot more life in it than it did. Just pathetic.

Here are videos for you all to enjoy of the 35R's first pass (the one in which it gave out at the top of 4th), and last pass....courtesy of my crappy Kodak EasyShare:

<embed width="448" height="361" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" src="http://i239.photobucket.com/player.swf?file=http://vid239.photobucket.com/albums/ff165/jusmx141/DSMTuners%20Stuff/GT35RFirstPass.flv">

<embed width="448" height="361" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" src="http://i239.photobucket.com/player.swf?file=http://vid239.photobucket.com/albums/ff165/jusmx141/DSMTuners%20Stuff/GT35RLastPass.flv">